Adventures in Coupon Clipping, Part 2: Epic Fail

You guys may recall what happened the last time I attempted to use coupons. (To summarize: It wasn't pretty.) Still, I needed to use the $25 restaurant coupons I bought back in this post, so on Tuesday night, Rory and I headed out to a nearby Italian restaurant, coupon in hand.

8:35 Bread basket arrives. Eh. I'm not that into dry Italian bread. But I still ate a piece. With the right amount of olive oil, anything tastes good.

8:50 App arrives. Kind of a shoddy portion, but enough to tide us over, I figured.

9:15 Borderline starving.

9:25 Dinner arrives. We're by no means food snobs. However, Rory works at a food mag, so we've eaten some pretty tasty grub. I give this meal, eh, out of 10, maybe a four. Or a three, since it shouldn't have taken an hour to boil water.

9:45 Dinner is cleared. Ask for check.

10:00 Ask for check again.

10:05 Check arrives. $75. So with a 20 percent tip (undeserved, but I've been a waitress, so I always tip 20 percent) that's $90. But we have our jazzy $25 coupon! After several "we're using a coupon" jokes, Rory tucks the coupon and $65 into the check holder.

10:10 Server takes check holder.

10:12 Server comes back, frantic. "We don't take these coupons." Rory, "But it's a coupon to your restaurant. See, the name and address are right there." Server, "The manager says we don't take them. Let me get the manager." As I mentioned in this post, I'm so not a "Get the manager!" type of customer, so the situation was getting increasingly uncomfortable.

10:13 Manager arrives. "We don't take these coupons." Rory, "But it's a coupon to your restaurant. See, the name and address are right there." Manager, "I know, right? But see, we signed up to be on restaurant.com, but they stopped reimbursing us, so we don't take their coupons anymore." Rory, "But it doesn't expire." Manager, "Look, I know how you feel. I'm a smoker, and I went to use a 50 cent off coupon for my cigarettes yesterday, and the deli didn't accept it." Rory, [blank expression]. Manager, "I know, right? I totally know how you feel." Rory, [blank expression]. Manager, "So we'll come back for this, okay?" Hands Rory check holder.

10:20 After briefly discussing our limited options, Rory and I decide to fork over the $25 and call it a night. (Making a run for it crossed my mind, but I was wearing three-inch heels.)

I'm upset about this for three reasons:

I recommended the site because my mom and my friend Leslie (two of my favorite bargain hounds) both use it and love it. I really thought it was going to be awesome.

I have 10 more $25 restaurant coupons (to different restaurants) that I'm going to be too scared to use.

If I call restaurant.com to complain, what are they going to do? Send me more coupons? No thanks.

At the end of the day, I'm only out $47, so it's not the end of the world. Still, it's $47. And I really want to be a person who uses coupons! They're like free money!

But I can't have any of it, apparently.

Have you guys ever had a horrible experience using coupons? Can someone please share a positive coupon-using experience? I need you to restore my faith!